2 - Peronism in Argentina: left or right?

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Populist movements usually emerge as events: no one is expecting them, but they suddenly take place. Because they directly affect established domination regimes, due to the fact that they are anti-establishment movements strongly supported by important sectors of the subaltern classes, both adhering and opposing sides tend to highlight their disruptive character. The former experience them as revolutions, and the latter as cursed creations of a leader with authoritarian tendencies and charismatic attributes who manages to ideologically manipulate the masses by resorting to irrational elements. Fortunately, these longstanding, deep-rooted categorizations have progressively lost their strength and have led to less emotionally and politically driven analyses. However, there is still a tendency in this direction, as seen in questions like the ones in the title of this chapter, which (as many others) seeks to analyse the Argentine case of populism in terms of whether Peronism is right wing or left wing. But is this question as posed even appropriate to better understand a phenomenon such as Peronism? A perspective anchored in a “Yes, it is”/“No, it is not” polarity can only partially ensure a critical and objective approach to explain Peronism. It is my intention to explore the conceptual potential of the idea of simultaneity as a passive revolution, in terms of the relationship between Peronism and the working class, to allow us to bring the heterogeneity of historical reality into play.

EX MACHINA ORIGIN

A prevailing tendency of sociologists, historians and political scientists, when interpreting Peronism, was to search for its permanent characteristics in its original stage. Gino Germani, an Italian sociologist who escaped fascism, was the initiator of that initial scheme, based on a structural-functionalist interpretation of a failed correspondence between socioeconomic modernization and political participation. This concept was surpassed gradually. As decades passed, an explanation anchored in its origin was seen as insufficient to describe it, either as a political identity that remained unshakable for most of the Argentinian working class or in terms of the politico-ideological evolution that occurred in the country as of the 1960s.